Letter to Karl Korsch

I thought I would add some of my comments to one of these so Caj and Brosa don't have to do all the work here

For example I don’t think “the way you express yourself” about Russia is correct. We can’t say that “the Russian revolution was a bourgeois revolution”. The 1917 revolution was a proletarian revolution, even If generalising about the “tactical” lessons which can be derived from it is a mistake. The problem we are presented with now is this: What will become of the proletarian dictatorship in one country if revolutions don’t follow elsewhere. There may be a counterrevolution, there may be an external intervention, or there may be a degenerative process in which case it would be a matter of uncovering the symptoms and reflexes within the communist party.

I agree with Bordiga here that we shouldn't characterize the Russian Revolution as bourgeois. To do such is to completely ignore the basis of the party and who carried it out, which was the russsian working class. Sure in the long run it ended up fulfilling the job of a bourgeois revolution (industrialization, creation of modern agricultural practices, elimination of the feudal aristocracy, etc.), but the revolution was carried out the working class and their organs with the intent of abolishing what capitalism had developed in Russia. Also to me that labeling the russian revolution as bourgeois is an overly simplistic way of trying to dismiss concepts like the vanguard and other leninist ideas. I think Bordiga also frames the real issue in correct way especially given the hindsight we have now.

It would appear that you rule out the possibility of the Russian Communist Party engaging in any other politics than that which equates with the restoration of capitalism. This is tantamount to a justification of Stalin, or to support for the inadmissible politics of “giving up power”. Rather it is necessary to say that a correct and classist policy for Russia would have been possible if the whole of the “Leninist old guard” hadn’t made a series of serious mistakes in international policy.

I think this point is pretty relevant to discussions to be had with tendencies that reject the proletarian nature of the russian revolution and by extension bolshevism in general now a days. It seems that by doing this they attempt to by pass the part I bolded, since if it was a bourgeois revolution then we get to oppose Stalin anyways for being bourgeois leader and the working class and it's party (or organs since they oppose the concept of parties) has no power to give up. But as I said before this ignores the history of the bolshevik party and the russian revolution and is thus very problematic. By not falling into this trap we are able to truly learn from the mistakes of the bolsheviks and apply the lessons we learned to class struggle today.

All the reasoning with which you justify your attitude toward the Fischer group, that is that you counted on pushing it to the left, or if it refused, to devalue it in the eyes of the workers, leaves me unconvinced, and it seems to me that de facto good results have not come of it.

Does anyone have any information about who the Fischer group was and what positions they held?

In the past we didn’t contest the Russian communist party’s state policy as long as it remained on terrain corresponding to the two documents, Lenin’s speech on the Tax in Kind and Trotsky’s report to the 4th World Congress. We agree with Lenin’s theses at the 2nd Congress.

Looks like I have some more reading to do.

Given the politics of pressure and provocation from the leaders of the International and from its sections, any organisation of national and international groups, which are against the rightist deviation, involves the perils of secessionism. We needn’t aspire to a splitting of the parties and the International. Before a split is possible, we need to allow the experience of an artificial and mechanical discipline, with the resulting absurd practices, to run their course, never renouncing however our political and ideological positions or expressing solidarity with the prevailing line. The groups which subscribe to a completely traditional left ideology aren’t able to solidarise unconditionally with the Russian opposition but neither can they condemn its recent submission; which didn’t indicate a reconciliation but rather conditions under which the only other alternative would have been a split. The objective situation both in Russia and elsewhere is such that to be hounded out of the Comintern would mean having still less chance of modifying the course of the working-class struggle than by being inside the part.

I think Bordiga is being too optimistic here about being able to modify the course of working class struggle while still operating with in the Comintern. By the time this letter was written it was pretty clear that the right wing and the center of the Russian party had won out and past attempts at trying to steer the party away from this route (like the Workers' Group) had been defeated by these same elements before this period. But I think this raises a good question, when is it right to split and how does one prevent oneself from being diminishing one's influence over class struggle in order to continue the fight against opportunistic and rightist deviations?

5. All means which don’t exclude the right to remain in the party must be used to denounce the prevailing trend as one leading to opportunism and in contrast with faithfulness to the programmatic principles of the International, principles which other groups apart from ourselves also have the right to defend provided they set themselves the problem of seeking out the initial deficiencies - not theoretical, but tactical, organisational and disciplinary ones which have rendered the Third International still more susceptible to degenerative dangers[...]

This passage doesn't make to much sense and I fear it might have to do with it not being complete.

The end of the letter I'll need to let soak in a bit more and study some more of the issues at the time to fully understand why Bordiga chose those stances, but I can't help but feel that some of his actions in regards to the degeneration of the USSR and the Comintern to be overly optimistic or naive. However this is with the benefit of hindsight and knowing what Stalin would eventually do.